Harry Potter Special Extended Editions (a WIP)

Hey all!  So, I recently took a vacation with my family to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios in Florida, and needless to say it got me way back into the Harry Potter spirit and I got the idea for these edits.

Basically these will be edits along the lines of Adywan’s Revisited edits of Star Wars, though maybe not as extreme.  The idea is to create a more seamless continuity between the films, because as it is, the transition between films is pretty jarring in terms of visual style.  I am not wanting to create completely different films.  I am not cutting the films down to be “better”, but rather matching the visual styles and eliminating any major continuity errors between films.

Here is my list of goals so far.  Please put forth any ideas of your own that may help:

• Replace wands in Philosopher’s/Sorcerer’s Stone and Chamber of Secrets to match later films.

-color correct all movies to match visually (eliminating the crazy blue and green color grades of the later 4 films)

-Re-insert deleted scenes, provided they don’t create continuity errors.

-Insert occasional John Williams music into GOF, OOTP, HBP, and DH

-Matching end credits for ALL movies.

-(possibly) Matching opening titles? (not sure on that one.  I’d like to hear what everyone thinks of it.)

-Emphasize and better show importance of the Deathly Hallows in last 2 films.

-Pensieve sequence in Goblet of Fire match pensieve sequences in later films

-Pitch down Griphook the goblin’s voice in Philosopher’s Stone (“lamp please”) to more closely resemble Deathly Hallows Griphook

I didn’t want to make a thread about this until I had some test clips ready, but I got excited and couldn’t wait. =)  Again, any ideas/imput is welcome.

Just so people know I can pull this off, I have a fairly good understanding of After Effects and have done work similar to what is to be involved in this in the past.

I am working on some tests.  I think first test clip will be ollivander's to show wand replacement.

Ideas and feedback still welcome and appreciated.

Well I don't think the idea was ever that there was only ONE invisibility cloak, rather that it was a very specific, special invisibility cloak.  That is was Death's own invisibility cloak.  My plans don't really include cutting anything out.  My plans for the Deathly Hallows is to more greatly emphasize their importance, rather than brush them even more under the rug.

I applaud the idea.

Though if you're looking to reinsert all deleted scenes, you should be aware that a hefty amount of footage is present in the film trailers while completely absent from any special features. For instance: in the Half-Blood Prince trailers, there's a shot of Ginny being disarmed of her wand that isn't in the final cut (the funny thing is that if you look closely in the film you can see Ginny pick it back up again). In another trailer, Snape mutters, "It's over," as he watches Dumbledore falls dead from the tower.

There's a comprehensive list of all sorts of unreleased deleted scenes here if you're interested (most of them are just images, but it's fun to look through).

I'm also glad to find someone who doesn't like the colors of the last few films too. My biggest issue is that they're so dark, to the point where you can barely see anything at some points (especially in DH1).

If I could make some suggestions:

- Add Hedwig's Theme in to the beginning of DH2. I think I died a little inside when I saw that the film completely disregarded this tradition in favor of Lily's Theme.

-  If you're going to add in the deleted scene in Chamber of Secrets where the Grey Lady is humming as Harry is trying to read Tom Riddle's diary, maybe you could try to make her look the way she does in DH2. I don't know if this is even possible, or what your or the program's limitations are, but it's something to consider.

- This is a personal preference, but maybe you could try to do something about that idiotic opening scene in Half-Blood Prince where Harry and that coffee shop girl set up a date. I can't believe Harry would be so much of a numbskull that he'd bring a Daily Prophet into a muggle coffee shop and then not hide it when the girl came along. Maybe you could at least remove the line where she mentions that she saw a picture move, to imply that muggles just can't "see" the pictures the same way wizards can. It's just something that's irked me for a while.

Also, when you mention matching the visual styles, what style do you have in mind? For what it's worth, I've always felt that the supernatural occurences in first two or three films actually feel like magic; the other movies I feel treat the magic like pure science fiction (especially in the last two movies). Just my personal preferences at work again, but I'm interested to hear what your preferred style is (and what you hope to do with the films that don't match it).

I certainly prefer the visual style of the earlier films, (my favorite is POA) however making all the films adhere to that style is just not possible. So my gener idea is just creating a more natural flow of visual style so that the difference between films is not so jarring. This includes maybe adding some visual concepts from earlier films into the later ones (color, etc.)  as well as adding some from later film into earlier (wand replacement, etc).  

As for the deleted scenes, I did say all unless they create continutiy errors. So if the scene does not exist in it's entirety, or requires extensive effects work beyond my skill level, it unfortunately will not make the cut. The grey lady scene would be a good example of something I would not be able to accomplish with my skill set and would create visual continuity errors as is. 

Not a clip, but something visual for eyeballs.

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/108452

Look's good!

I assume you'll be using "Philosopher's Stone" in favor of "Sorcerer's Stone"?

I will probably release one for sorcerer's and one for philosophers. I personally favor philosophers but if there's enough interest in a separate release for sorcerers I will ablige. It only involves swapping out a couple scenes.

This is definitely a project I plan to follow. I wish I could be of assistance, but I have no experience with After Effects and haven't actually done any edits 

is this only with english language or is there a plan with more language?

I was only planning on English but i suppose if there is enough of an interest, I can potebtially consider foreign language tracks. 

I cannot wait to see your extended cuts! Especially with DH2, as the colouring was too dark to see anything for most of the battle and I could not see a thing which was mainly why I did not enjoy it as much! 

Please let us know where we can watch these cuts once you are complete of them. I'd recommend reinserting any deleted scenes from the trailers too as the some of the ones from HBP (Greyback disarming Ginny and Snape's "Its over" line) can be reinserted in as if they were deleted scenes with nothing else needed to complete them. 

As well, I have started a petition to release the unreleased deleted scenes from the series which if interested you and others can check out here: https://www.change.org/p/warner-bros-release-the-unreleased-harry-potter-deleted-scenes

Also if you or anyone has the POA ultimate Edition Blu ray, would you please upload in some way the deleted scenes if they are in better quality than the letterboxed ones we got on the initial Blu ray and DVD? 

Hey this sounds cool, I have all 7 Ultimate Editions on Blu Ray if you need me to rip anything from the discs to help out. I also have ADigitalMans EE of 1 - 5 and Doctor Ms HBP EE if you'd like them as a reference.

I like this idea, I was considering doing edits for all 8 that stick a lot closer to the books similar to the Red Book edits of Lord of the rings but I'm just not sure there is enough material from the books in movies 4 - 6 to make a whole movie.

There are 2 Fan Edits the PS and COS Revisited that aim to make the first two look a little closer to the movies from 3 to 8 I'd suggest giving them a look as they are pretty fantastic and could help with ideas for music changes etc. Good Luck.

Oh and also I don't have a huge amount of spare time but if you need help with any editing I'd be able to help here and there.

there actually is a lot of material from the deleted scenes alone if only to fix pacing issues etc. may wanna also consider taking out the malfoy crap from half blood prince as aside from the first and last times (with the death eaters) that he goes into the Room of Requirement the rest of those malfoy bits are completely pointless to the movie. put deleted scenes in to fill in the pacing holes from removing them 

RedBook said:

Hey this sounds cool, I have all 7 Ultimate Editions on Blu Ray if you need me to rip anything from the discs to help out. I also have ADigitalMans EE of 1 - 5 and Doctor Ms HBP EE if you'd like them as a reference. I like this idea, I myself was considering doing edits for all 8 that stick a lot closer to the books similar to the Red Book edits of Lord of the rings but I'm just not sure there is enough material from the books in movies 4 - 6 to make a whole movie. Good Luck. Oh and also I don't have a huge amount of spare time but if you need help with any editing I'd be able to help here and there.

i could use the deleted scenes from Prisoner of Azkaban's ultimate edition as they are in better quality than they were on the standard dvd/blu ray 

You know the director took all the pensive scenes out of the script to put in all the filler bs we got, the HP films were butchered awfully from movies 4 - 8 and even 3 wasn't particularly faithful it still left out tonnes. Sets and costumes got heaps better imo but the scripts ..... smh.

Yeah I'll rip the deleted scenes tonight most likely.

thanks for the offer To rip things for me. I actually have the same versions so I'm good on that front. As for suggestions I'm kind of taking this one film at a time do my focus is (as far as hp goes) completely SS/PS at the moment. I'm sorry there hasn't been much going on here lately. This project is still alive but as many of us know, life gets in the way so for this and other projects, it's been a slow burn. 

RedBook said:

You know the director took all the pensive scenes out of the script to put in all the filler bs we got, the HP films were butchered awfully from movies 4 - 8 and even 3 wasn't particularly faithful it still left out tonnes. Sets and costumes got heaps better imo but the scripts ..... smh.

Yeah I'll rip the deleted scenes tonight most likely.

 Thank you so much I really appreciate it! :)